Eliot A. Cohen is the Robert E. Osgood Professor of Strategic Studies at the
Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International StudiesThe Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies , a division of Johns Hopkins University based in Washington, D.C., is one of the world's most prestigious and leading graduate schools devoted to the study of international affairs, economics, diplomacy, and policy research and...
(SAIS) at the
Johns Hopkins UniversityThe Johns Hopkins University, commonly referred to as Johns Hopkins, JHU, or simply Hopkins, is a private research university located in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Johns Hopkins also maintains full-time campuses elsewhere in Maryland, Washington, D.C., Italy, China, and Singapore...
. Cohen is the Director of the Strategic Studies Program at SAIS and has specialized in the
Middle EastThe Middle East is a region that spans southwestern Asia, southeastern Europe, and northeastern Africa. It has no clear boundaries, often used as a synonym to Near East, in opposition to Far East...
,
Persian GulfThe Persian Gulf, in the Southwest Asian region, is an extension of the Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula. Historically and commonly known as the Persian Gulf, this body of water is sometimes controversially referred to as the Arabian Gulf by most Arab states or simply The...
,
IraqIraq , officially the Republic of Iraq , also known as Mesopotamia, is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert.Iraq shares borders with Jordan to the west, Syria...
,
arms controlArms control is an umbrella term for restrictions upon the development, production, stockpiling, proliferation, and usage of weapons, especially weapons of mass destruction...
, and
NATOThe North Atlantic Treaty Organization ); ), also called "the Atlantic Alliance", is an intergovernmental military alliance based on the North Atlantic Treaty which was signed on April 4, 1949...
. He is a member of the
Project for the New American CenturyThe Project for the New American Century was an American think tank based in Washington, D.C. that lasted from early 1997 to 2006. It was co-founded as a non-profit educational organization by conservatives William Kristol and Robert Kagan...
and "is one of the few teachers in the American academy to treat military history as a serious field" according to International Law scholar
Ruth WedgwoodRuth Wedgwood holds the Edward B. Burling Chair in International Law and Diplomacy at the School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, in Washington, D.C.- Family origins :Ruth Wedgwood is the daughter of labor lawyer Morris P...
. He served as Counselor to the
United States Department of StateThe United States Department of State, often referred to as the State Department, is the Cabinet-level foreign affairs agency of the United States government, similar to foreign ministries, foreign offices, ministries of external relations, etc. in other countries...
under Secretary
Condoleezza RiceCondoleezza Rice is a professor, diplomat, author, and national security expert. She served as the 66th United States Secretary of State, and the second to hold that office in the administration of President George W. Bush...
from 2007 to 2009.
Biography
Cohen is a graduate of the
Maimonides SchoolMaimonides School is a coeducational, Modern Orthodox, Jewish day school located in Brookline, Massachusetts. The school was founded in 1937 by Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik and is named after Rabbi Moses Maimonides....
. He received his B.A. in government at
Harvard UniversityHarvard University is a private university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts and a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1636 by the colonial Massachusetts legislature, Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and currently comprises ten separate academic units...
in 1977. He went on to receive a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1982 in political science, and during his PhD training went through the
Army ROTC programThe Reserve Officers' Training Corps is a college-based, officer commissioning program, predominantly in the United States. It is designed as a college elective that focuses on leadership development, problem solving, strategic planning, and professional ethics.The U.S...
at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
He was an assistant professor of government and assistant dean at Harvard University from 1982 to 1985. Following this, he taught for four years at the
Naval War CollegeThe Naval War College is an education and research institution of the United States Navy that specializes in developing ideas for naval warfare and passing them along to officers of the Navy. The college is located in Newport, Rhode Island...
in the Department of Strategy, before a brief period in 1990 serving on the policy planning staff of the Office of the
United States Secretary of DefenseThe United States Secretary of Defense is the head of the U.S. Department of Defense , concerned with the armed services and military matters. This position roughly corresponds to Minister of defense in other countries...
. In 1990, Cohen began his position at SAIS. Following the 1991 Persian Gulf War, he directed the
U.S. Air Force'sThe United States Air Force is the aerial warfare branch of the U.S. armed forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on 18 September 1947 under the National Security Act of 1947 - 80 P.L....
official four-volume survey, the
Gulf War Air Power SurveyThe Gulf War Air Power Survey is a report commissioned by the United States Air Force in 1993 to document and analyze its performance during the 1991 Gulf War. It consists of five sections each averaging over 700 pages, and a 276 summary report. It was one of the most popular reports issued by...
, until 1993, for which he received the Air Force’s Exemplary Civilian Service Award. This analysis of the effect of U.S. air power was widely referenced in regards to the
Revolution in Military AffairsThe military concept of Revolution in Military Affairs is a theory about the future of warfare, often connected to technological and organizational recommendations for change in the United States military and others....
concept.
In 1993,
Paul WolfowitzPaul Dundes Wolfowitz is a former United States Ambassador to Indonesia, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense, President of the World Bank, and former Dean of The Paul H...
, who would later become prominent as the Deputy Secretary of Defense in the run-up to the
Iraq warThe Iraq War, also known as the Occupation of Iraq or Operation Iraqi Freedom, is an ongoing military campaign which began on March 20, 2003 with the invasion of Iraq by a multinational force led by troops from the United States and the United Kingdom.Prior to the war, the governments of the United...
, became Dean of SAIS. During his brief stint at the defense policy planning staff, Cohen had worked under Wolfowitz but this was the first time they were in extended contact. In 1997, Cohen became a founding member of the
Project for the New American CenturyThe Project for the New American Century was an American think tank based in Washington, D.C. that lasted from early 1997 to 2006. It was co-founded as a non-profit educational organization by conservatives William Kristol and Robert Kagan...
, which became known as a center for prominent neoconservatives. He has been a member of the
Defense Policy Board Advisory CommitteeThe Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee, also referred to as the Defense Policy Board is a federal advisory committee to the United States Department of Defense. Their charter is available on line through the Director of the Office of Administration and Management of the Department of Defense...
, a committee of civilians and retired military officers that the U.S. Secretary of Defense may call upon for advice, since the beginning of the administration of President
George W. BushGeorge Walker Bush was the 43rd President of the United States from 2001 to 2009 and the 46th Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000....
. He was put on the board after acquaintance
Richard PerleRichard Norman Perle is an American political advisor and lobbyist who worked for the Reagan administration as an assistant Secretary of Defense and worked on the Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee from 1987 to 2004...
put forward his name. Cohen has referred to the
War on TerrorismThe War on Terrorism is the common term for the military, political, legal and ideological conflict against what the effort's leaders describe as Islamic terrorism and Islamic militants, and was specifically used in reference to operations by the...
as “World War IV”.
In the run-up to the
2003 Invasion of IraqThe 2003 invasion of Iraq, was led by the United States, backed by British forces and smaller contingents from Australia, Denmark, Poland and Spain. Four countries participated with troops during the initial invasion phase, which lasted from March 20 to May 1...
, he was a member of
Committee for the Liberation of IraqThe Committee for the Liberation of Iraq was described as a "non-governmental organization" which described itself as a "distinguished group of Americans" who wanted to "free Iraq from Saddam Hussein"...
, a group of prominent persons who pressed for an invasion.
On March 2, 2007, Cohen was appointed by Secretary of State
Condoleezza RiceCondoleezza Rice is a professor, diplomat, author, and national security expert. She served as the 66th United States Secretary of State, and the second to hold that office in the administration of President George W. Bush...
to serve as Counselor of the State Department, replacing
Philip D. ZelikowPhilip D. Zelikow is an American diplomat, academic and author. He has worked as the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, director of the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia, and Counselor of the United States Department of State...
.
Statements on US foreign policy
Cohen was one of the first neoconservatives to publicly advocate war against Iran and Iraq. In a November 2001 op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, Cohen identified what he called
World War IV and advocated the overthrow of Iran's government as a possible next step for the Bush Administration. Cohen claimed "regime change" in Iran could be accomplished with a focus on "pro-Western and anticlerical forces" in the Middle East and suggested that such an action would be "wise, moral and unpopular (among some of our allies)". He went on to argue that such a policy was as important as the then identified goal of
Osama Bin LadenOsama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden is a member of the prominent Saudi bin Laden family and one of the founders of the terrorist organization al-Qaeda, best known for the September 11 attacks on the United States and its associations with numerous other mass-casualty attacks against...
's capture: "The overthrow of the first theocratic revolutionary Muslim state and its replacement by a moderate or secular government, however, would be no less important a victory in this war than the annihilation of bin Laden."
Later in 2001, Cohen, in what was becoming a dominant theme of his writing, advocated war against Iraq once again and proceeded to outline how effortless such a military campaign would be:
After Afghanistan, what? Iraq is the big prize... One important element will be the use of the Iraqi National CongressThe Iraqi National Congress is an umbrella Iraqi opposition group led by Ahmed Chalabi. It was formed with the aid and direction of the United States government following the Gulf War, for the purpose of fomenting the overthrow of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.-History:INC was set up following the...
to help foster the collapse of the regime, and to provide a replacement for it. The INC, which has received bad, and in some cases malicious treatment, from the State Department and intelligence community over the years, may not be able to do the job with U.S. air support alone.
As a result of his public statements on why a war against Iraq was necessary, Cohen was invited to appear on
CNN Wolf BlitzerWolf Isaac Blitzer is an American journalist who has been a CNN reporter since 1990. Blitzer is currently the host of the newscast The Situation Room and was the host of the Sunday talk show Late Edition until it was discontinued on January 11, 2009...
Reports and amongst other statements given in response to questioning from Blitzer offered the judgement:
We know that he [Saddam Hussein] supports terror. There's very solid evidence that the Iraqis were behind an attempt to assassinate President Bush's father. And we -- by the way, we do know that there is a connection with the 9/11 terrorists. We do know that Mohamed Atta, the ringleader of the 9/11 terrorists, met with Iraqi intelligence in Prague. So...
In testifying to a Congressional House committee later in 2002 Cohen was quoted as saying:
..the choice before the United States is a stark one, either to acquiesce in a situation which permits the regime of Saddam Hussein to restore his economy, acquire weapons of mass destruction and pose a lethal threat to his neighbors and to us, or to take action to overthrow him. In my view, the latter course, with all of its risks, is the correct one. Indeed, the dangers of failing to act in the near future are unacceptable.
In a piece for the Wall Street Journal, 6 February 2003 Cohen fervently praised the presentation given by then Secretary of State
Colin PowellColin Luther Powell is an American statesman and a retired four-star general in the United States Army. He was the 65th United States Secretary of State , serving under President George W. Bush. He was the first African American appointed to that position...
in which he outlined the case for military action against Iraq to the United Nations. He went on to indicate that it was time for those who doubted that the case had been proven to support the Bush administration in their efforts.
An article written for the Washington Post on 10 July 2005, raised the attention of commentators in the media and "
blogosphereThe blogosphere is made up of all blogs and their interconnections. The term implies that blogs exist together as a connected community or as a social network in which everyday authors can publish their opinions....
". The piece, an attempt to articulate Cohen's self identified roles as academic, pundit, and father, was written as his son prepared to deploy to
IraqIraq , officially the Republic of Iraq , also known as Mesopotamia, is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert.Iraq shares borders with Jordan to the west, Syria...
to fight a war the elder Cohen had been calling for since early 2001. The piece ends:
There is a lot of talk these days about shaky public support for the war. That is not really the issue. Nor should cheerleading, as opposed to truth-telling, be our leaders' chief concern. If we fail in Iraq -- and I don't think we will -- it won't be because the American people lack heart, but because leaders and institutions have failed. Rather than fretting about support at home, let them show themselves dedicated to waging and winning a strange kind of war and describing it as it is, candidly and in detail. Then the American people will give them all the support they need. The scholar in me is not surprised when our leaders blunder, although the pundit in me is dismayed when they do. What the father in me expects from our leaders is, simply, the truth -- an end to happy talk and denials of error, and a seriousness equal to that of the men and women our country sends into the fight.
This piece was extensively discussed in the
blogosphereThe blogosphere is made up of all blogs and their interconnections. The term implies that blogs exist together as a connected community or as a social network in which everyday authors can publish their opinions....
at the time, with some progressive
blogA blog is a type of website, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order...
s decrying that Cohen continued to maintain that the invasion was justified. Other commentators expressed surprise that a figure with such access and impeccable neoconservative credentials could appear to criticise the Bush Administration in such a way. Cohen later stated that he had received overwhelmingly positive responses from senior military officials in a resulting interview on
C-SPANC-SPAN , an abbreviation of Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network, is an American cable television network dedicated to airing non-stop coverage of government proceedings and public affairs programming...
. Cohen also continued his criticism of the conduct of the war stating that, "Those three guys [
Tommy FranksGeneral Tommy Ray Franks, United States Army, KBE, is a retired General in the United States Army. His last Army post was as the Commander of the United States Central Command, overseeing United States Armed Forces operations in a 25-country region, including the Middle East...
,
George TenetGeorge John Tenet was the Director of Central Intelligence for the United States Central Intelligence Agency and is Distinguished Professor in the Practice of Diplomacy at Georgetown University...
, and
L. Paul BremerLewis Paul Bremer III , also nicknamed Jerry Bremer, is an American diplomat. He is most notable for being the U.S. Administrator of Iraq charged with overseeing the reconstruction of Iraq. In his role as head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, he reported primarily to the U.S...
] got the
Presidential Medal of FreedomThe Presidential Medal of Freedom is a decoration bestowed by the President of the United States and is, along with theequivalent Congressional Gold Medal bestowed by an act of U.S. Congress, the highest civilian award in the U.S...
. That's just wrong."
As a member of the
Defense Policy Board Advisory CommitteeThe Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee, also referred to as the Defense Policy Board is a federal advisory committee to the United States Department of Defense. Their charter is available on line through the Director of the Office of Administration and Management of the Department of Defense...
Cohen had also been engaged in meetings involving US President
George BushGeorge Walker Bush was the 43rd President of the United States from 2001 to 2009 and the 46th Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000....
. During these meetings Cohen provided advice on strategy in the Iraq conflict.
Appointment to Department of State
On 2 March 2007, it was reported by the Washington Post that Cohen was to be appointed as
Condoleezza RiceCondoleezza Rice is a professor, diplomat, author, and national security expert. She served as the 66th United States Secretary of State, and the second to hold that office in the administration of President George W. Bush...
's "counselor" at the
United States Department of StateThe United States Department of State, often referred to as the State Department, is the Cabinet-level foreign affairs agency of the United States government, similar to foreign ministries, foreign offices, ministries of external relations, etc. in other countries...
. Cohen replaced
Philip D. ZelikowPhilip D. Zelikow is an American diplomat, academic and author. He has worked as the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, director of the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia, and Counselor of the United States Department of State...
and said he would fill time before appointment in April 2007 by acting as a consultant for Rice.
The tone of the Washington Post article, Cohen is described as a "critic" of the Iraq war, was soon criticised. An article by Ximena Ortiz in the
National Interest Online called Cohen's ability to do the job into question and attempted to juxtapose his previous statements on the Bush administration foreign policy with the resulting war in Iraq. Adding to the criticism was
Glenn GreenwaldGlenn Greenwald is an American lawyer, columnist, blogger, and author. Greenwald worked as a constitutional and civil rights litigator prior to becoming a contributor to Salon.com, where he focuses on political and legal topics...
of
Salon.comSalon.com, part of Salon Media Group , often just called Salon, is an online magazine, with content updated each weekday. American liberal politics is its major focus, but it covers a range of issues. Reviews and articles about music, books and films are also a prominent feature of the site....
who, describing Cohen as "extremist a neoconservative and warmonger as it gets", suggested an internal significance of the appointment for the Bush administration:
The Cohen appointment, is clearly another instance where neoconservatives place a watchdog in potential trouble spots in the government to ensure that diplomats do not stray by trying to facilitate rapproachments between the U.S. and the countries on the neoconservative War hit list.
As the controversy was played out in the media a rebuttal of sorts from
Ruth WedgwoodRuth Wedgwood holds the Edward B. Burling Chair in International Law and Diplomacy at the School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, in Washington, D.C.- Family origins :Ruth Wedgwood is the daughter of labor lawyer Morris P...
, international law scholar at Johns Hopkins University, sought to defend Cohen from criticism. Ortiz was subsequently supported in her criticism by fellow commentator at
National Interest Online,
Anatol LievenAnatol Lieven is a British author, journalist, and policy analyst. He is presently a Senior Researcher (Peter Paul) Anatol Lieven (28 june 1960) is a British author, journalist, and policy analyst. He is presently a Senior Researcher (Peter Paul) Anatol Lieven (28 june 1960) is a British author,...
, who raised the levels of criticism to include Cohens efforts as a historian and analyst as well as tackling other pronouncements on US foreign policy in the middle east made by Cohen.
Mearsheimer and Walt Paper
In March 2006, Harvard's Kennedy School of Government Academic Dean Stephen M. Walt along with Professor John J. Mearsheimer of the
University of ChicagoThe University of Chicago is a private, coeducational research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by oil magnate and benefactor John D...
, both political scientists, published an academic paper titled
The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign PolicyThe Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy is the title of a book by John Mearsheimer, Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, and Stephen Walt, Professor of International Relations at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, published in late August 2007 by...
. The paper criticizes the Israel lobby for influencing U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East away from U.S. interests and towards Israel's interests. Eliot Cohen, who is Jewish, wrote in a prominent
op-edAn op-ed, abbreviated from opposite the editorial page , is a newspaper article that expresses the opinions of a named writer who is usually unaffiliated with the newspaper's editorial board. These are different from editorials, which are usually unsigned and written by editorial board members...
piece in
The Washington PostThe Washington Post is the newspaper with the largest circulation in Washington, D.C. and is the city's oldest paper, founded in 1877. Being located in the nation's capital, it has a particular emphasis on national politics and international affairs...
that the academic working paper bears all the traditional hallmarks of
anti-SemitismAntisemitism is prejudice against or hostility towards Jews, often rooted in hatred of their ethnic background, culture, or religion....
: "obsessive and irrationally hostile beliefs about Jews", accusations toward Jews of "disloyalty, subversion or treachery, of having occult powers and of participating in secret combinations that manipulate institutions and governments", as well as selection of "everything unfair, ugly or wrong about Jews as individuals or a group" and equally systematical suppression of "any exculpatory information". Mearsheimer and Walt repeatedly denied the assertion that their paper was Anti-Semitic noting that criticism of Israeli state policy and influential American advocates of that policy, such as Cohen, is not the same thing as demonization of Jewish people.
Published works
- Citizens and Soldiers: The Dilemmas of Military Service (1985)
- Military Misfortunes : The Anatomy of Failure in War, Free Press, 1990, ISBN 0-02-906060-5.
- With Thomas A. Keaney, Gulf War Air Power Survey Summary Report, United States Government Printing Office
The U.S. Government Printing Office is an agency of the legislative branch of the United States federal government. The office prints and provides access to documents produced by and for all three branches of the federal government, including the Supreme Court, the Congress, the Executive Office...
, 1993, ISBN 0-16-041950-6. (Note that the full report has four parts.)
- With Keaney, Revolution in Warfare?: Air Power in the Persian Gulf, Naval Institute Press, 1995, ISBN 1-55750-131-9
- Knives, Tanks, and Missiles: Israel's Security Revolution, Washington Institute for Near East Policy
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy is a Washington, DC-based think tank which concerns itself with U.S.-Middle East policy. It was founded in 1985, with backing from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee , by Martin Indyk, an American lobbyist and research director for AIPAC,...
, 1998, ISBN 0-944029-72-8.
- Editor with John Bayliss, et al. Strategy in the Contemporary World: Introduction to Strategic Studies, Oxford University Press
Oxford house Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. they are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as OUP's...
, 2002, ISBN 0-19-878273-X.
- With Andrew Bacevich
Andrew J. Bacevich, Sr. is a professor of international relations at Boston University, former director of its Center for International Relations , and author of several books, including American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of US Diplomacy , The New American Militarism: How Americans...
, War Over Kosovo, Columbia University PressColumbia University Press is a university press based in New York City, and affiliated with Columbia University. It is currently directed by James D. Jordan and publishes titles in the humanities and sciences, including the fields of literary and cultural studies, history, social work, sociology,...
, 2002, ISBN 0-231-12482-1.
- Supreme Command: Soldiers, Statesmen, and Leadership in Wartime, Free Press
Free Press may refer to:*Freedom of the press*Free Press , a non-partisan, non-profit organization founded by media critic Robert McChesney to promote more democratic media policy in the United States...
, 2002, ISBN 0-7432-3049-3.
External links
- Rebuilding America's Defenses, controversial PNAC manifesto to which Cohen is a signatory
- World War IV, Wall Street Journal featured editorial by Cohen, 20 November 2001
- A Hawk Questions Himself as His Son Goes to War, op-ed by Cohen in the Washington Post, 10 July 2005
- Transcript of interview with Cohen, C-SPAN
C-SPAN , an abbreviation of Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network, is an American cable television network dedicated to airing non-stop coverage of government proceedings and public affairs programming...
Q&A program, 31 July 2005
- Neither Fools Nor Cowards: Barriers between military service and higher education do a disservice to both, op-ed by Cohen in the Wall Street Journal, 13 May 2005